Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Home again. Back to work, real life, less kölsch (more Brooklyn lager) and maybe the occasional blog post. While in Amsterdam, Prague and Germany I managed to find another 32 pounds of books. I checked the delivery status of my first shipment to find it arrived to the Errata office in Chelsea. Yesterday after coming from the airport I ran over to pick the books up only to find the sturdy well packed box nearly transformed into the shape of a ball. Crushed corners, one seam on the side fully open to where you could see the bubble wrapped books inside (customs treatment??) and to my horror... a sign that moisture had creeped up one side like the box had sat in a puddle.

With my trembling hands I tore the box open cursing DHL and as I started unpacking the books I was amazed that only one title out of the 16 had suffered during shipping, the rest were safe and sound.

Some of the titles I shipped in that package had come from Bernd Detsch of Art Book Cologne which I have mentioned here on 5B4 before when I was in Cologne last year. Art Book Cologne is a remainder house on Deutzer Freiheit 107 across the Rhein from the city center. If you visit Cologne I strongly suggest you make a visit. Bernd has been dealing in the business for years and has a great selection of books at big discounts. If you ask nicely, maybe he will let you walk through the warehouse and among the palettes of books, many are titles not listed on his regular site but ones he sells at good prices on-line through ABE and other listing sites. He also has his own private collection of artbooks that are not for sale in the back which would make anyone envious.

It's pretty fascinating to see what becomes a remainder, or what gets discovered in a warehouse somewhere and turns up at his place. For instance, the huge stack of Anthony Hernadez's Landscapes for the Homeless (Volume 1) - a book I had on my want list for some time now. He has them in mint shape for 40 euros.

Last year Art Book Cologne was where I found several Christian Boltanski books, a great El Lissitsky reprint of About 2 Squares, Ilya Kabokov's My Mother's Album, and several others. This year I found a great 1990 catalog of photography by the late Sigmar Polke from the Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden, shrink-wrapped copies of the two-volume Richard Prince Paintings and Photographs from 2002 and Marcel Broodthaers Texte et Photos from 2003.

For me, as an American, even with the added shipping costs it is a chance to get some great deals on European remainders which would be rather expensive in the States. Check them out here.